Leaning against his stained and worn mop, self-titled Sanitation Captain Roger Jenkins tries to discreetly wipe grime from his cheek while he stretches his list of tasks into a soliloquy of the mundane. Roger is dressed in a muted grey jumpsuit with a zipper that had more then a few snaggled teeth. A variety of brownish stains mar the once pristine cloth. Years of hard work had soiled it and now you could only see its true color underneath the collar that lay unevenly upon his shoulders. His gloves, the original color of which I won’t dare to venture a guess, are now thickly coated with a grime that simply smear more onto his face as he tries to clean his cheek.
Undeterred by the noticeable antipathy of the mid-20’s brunette reporter, there to catch a glimpse of life aboard the pride of the United States Space Force, Roger Jenkins continues to drone on about the intricate ins and outs of cleaning a spaceship.
“Yeah, the whole crew is a bunch of slobs. They don’t ever tell me they appreciate it, but I know they’d miss me if I wasn’t here.” He tells himself more-so than the news team.
A large metal blast door opens on the left while Roger talks the Channel 6 News team through his thoughts on sanitary napkins, and the innovative way he stacks them. The Navigator, a slender yet inposing man named Carl Libre comes strolling through the door having an animated conversation with a large, surly looking mechanic. Noticing Roger, the two men exiting the Bridge veer to their left and kick the mop out of Roger’s hand, sending him staggering into the wall.
“There’s a spot of shit on the wall there Cap. Cuck,” they holler back, cackling to themselves. “Make sure you get it before you clean my sheets. Your wife made a hell of a mess last night.”
“W-w-We’re separated..” Roger stammers, trying to regain his composure but the flush in his cheeks give him away.
“Sorry?” Asks the young reporter, timidly.
“My wife and me. We’re.. we’re separated.” Roger mumbled awkwardly to his shoes.
“Maybe I’ll just forget his sheets tonight.” he whispers to the camera with a forced smirk, in a desperate attempt to seize some control of the situation.
“What was that??” Yells Lieutenant Otherby, standing in the blast door leading from the Bridge. Roger hadn’t heard it open again.
“Did I hear you say you’d neglect your duty to one of these fine men, Roger?” Demanded Lt. Otherby sternly, his powerful fists resting on his hips, spittle flying from his mouth.
Roger shifts nervously, regretting his timing and hopelessly wishing he were anywhere but in this damned hallway.
“H-he was making fun of me Sir!” Roger barely manages through a gulp that sounds as though it might rip its way through his throat and punch a hole right through the four inch thick alloy walls that make up the hull of the ship.
“Look boy,” Lt. Otherby says marching up to Roger and planting a finger in his chest, only half looking at him, as he was distracted by the shapely ass of the reporter, “that man right there is an expert navigator. He’s the finest that our planet can supply. We need him rested up as best we can, and that means clean sheets, you understand? We all know what a mess that Super Soaker of a wife of yours can make, don’t we?” he finishes with a wink at the reporter, and a sharp elbow into the ribs of Roger.
“Yes sir.” Was all Roger could say without his voice breaking. Tears welling up in his eyes as he stares down at his mop, he gingerly rubs his ribs. The Lieutenant wipes the finger that touched Roger on the side of his fatigues as he marches after Carl, stopping briefly to ask the reporter if she’d like to see first-hand what kind of mess they can make Roger clean up.
“Well, I-I guess we can go take a look at one of these rooms they need cleaned.” Roger quivers.
Leading the way with a miserly gait, he takes two sharp lefts, and a quick right into the third door down a sparsely decorated corridor. This is the crew’s sleeping quarters, everyone lower than a commanding officer has a room here, except Roger. He sleeps in a small room that looks remarkably like a janitor’s closet.
With two quick knocks, Roger briskly enters the room bracing himself to see what mess has been laid to bare. He stops after a single step, dumbstruck. From the edge of the doorway, the camera man slowly leans to his left until the inside of the room is exposed to his lens.
From amidst the jumble of sheets, and through a thick, unnatural purple haze that hangs like smog in the room, a pair of glistening breasts are seen heaving six feet above the bed, connected to a woman floating unsuspended. Her body rhythmically convulsing to the magical words that hung in the air like a steel battle drum pounded between mountains.
“MOSTUNAFFARRR! DOADRIAL UNTA FOSCAR!”
At these words, the corporeal figure stiffened, and gave a shriek of pleasure that rather than muting the rhythms of the wizard, seemed make them echo harder until the room shook in its stillness. As the vibration of the words rose into a buzz beyond hearing, the environment of nearly pure oxygen became increasingly humid, until the very walls seemed to squirt. But they didn’t.
Roger’s wife did.
After a few tense moments, the haze lifted. It had seemed at first to make the room more disheveled, but upon clearing Roger realized it had only masked the true extent of the mess. It now seemed as though he had only caught the last of several trysts that day.
The words seemed to hang in the air much longer than they ought to have, and as the echo eventually dissipated the woman floated back down to the bed with a featherlike grace, nestling into the bed when she landed, satisfied and enraptured. She was too drunk on passion to notice the group of people gawking from the doorway.
Scrambling from the bed before she touched down, now stood a tall and slender man with a white beard, long streaming hair, and arcane tattoos covering his chest and arms.
Moving fluidly over to his nightstand, the wizard grabbed a midnight blue hand towel embroidered with golden stars. He pressed it into his face, and worked it down to wring out his beard in a methodical motion that hinted at experience. As he worked to dry himself, he grabbed his mangled and slightly soggy soft pack of Marlboro 27’s off the stand, and lit one with a spell he had devised to be able to smoke in the high oxygen environment. Taking a long drag, he turned toward the door and for the first time noticed the unannounced guests.
“Ahh, didn’t see you there Rog!” the wizard exclaimed with a laugh, strolling toward him with long, agile strides.
“Sorry about the mess, you know how it goes!” he chuckled while giving Roger a small punch to the bicep. When he pulled away, the wizard use the soaked towel to clean off the spot on his knuckles where he had touched Roger. He then grabbed a single end of the towel and slapped it over Rogers shoulder where it landed it a loud, wet slap, casting droplets across the news team.
“You know, Roger, every job in a spaceship is vital and irreplaceable.” As he spoke, he was admiring himself in the mirror. Tugging his hair into place, and moving this way and that, as to admire his body, while blowing smoke rings of increasingly intricate shapes. He pulled on a pair of maroon trousers trimmed with silver, and made a half turn in the mirror to praise the fit.
He continued serenely, “From the engineer who keeps the craft running smoothly, the pilot who navigates the often confusing and treacherous interstellar highways, to the ‘Sanitation Captain’,” he said with a wink and smirk, “who keeps the toilets stocked and the sheets starched.”
“And of course, the wizard who allows the ship to go faster than light in the first place.” He concluded slyly.
“Couldn’t do it without you Rog.” He said, as he stepped around him, and out of the room. Stepping into the hallway, he smacked the ass of the reporter, now acknowledging her for the first time, then hesitated and leaned back into the door frame.
“Get her cleaned up for me would you bud?” and with that, he turned and strutted toward the Bridge, readjusting and scratching his crotch as he walked.
The door closed on the news crew in the passage, leaving Roger alone with his wife. As the mechanical door slid home with a clang, the last they heard of Roger was a small whimper from the darkness.
